Our patent suggestion is for Internet Radio Broadcasting to allow users to make requests from their Internet Browsers or other client applications accessing the Internet and hear them over the Internet. Currently there aren""t any Internet applications that allow for users to make real time requests for music or select audio songs, have them played back in an orderly fashion while allowing for the optional use of typed dedications to be spoken back over the audio stream.
The field of this invention relates to broadcasting and more particularly to broadcasting of radio over the Internet to be received by listeners oil computers and other Internet aware devices.
The broadcasting of radio by means of the Internet is a fairly recent development. When a listener logs onto a particular web site, audio files, usually songs, are played. The selections of which audio files are to be played are controlled by the owner or operator of the web site.
In the past, in conjunction with conventional radio a desirable procedure was to get the listeners involved in conjunction with the broadcasting station. Generally, this type of procedure increased the number of listeners, and of course the greater number of listeners the more successful a radio station. One way to get the listeners involved is to have the radio station accept requests for particular songs or to hear certain audio files, such as a comedy routine. Generally, within conventional radio stations, requests are taken by telephone. It would be desirable to somehow incorporate in conjunction with an Internet radio station a technique for the Internet radio station to accept requests and dedications from listeners.
The primary embodiment of the present invention relates to a method of Internet radio broadcasting including listener requests and dedications which comprises of the following steps after a listener logs onto an Internet radio station. The primary embodiment then displays a search screen on the computer screen of the listener, which allows the listener to search for a particular audio and/or video. The listener then selects by the search screen a selected audio and/or video. The next step involves displaying on the computer screen of the listener a search results screen which displays one or more audio and/or videos which correspond to the audio and/or video search information inputted by the listener. The listener then selects a particular audio and/or video file in the search results screen. Also displayed on the search results screen is a dedication section allowing the listener to input a dedication to be spoken prior to the selected audio and/or video file. The listener inputs his/her dedication into this section. He/she may either type this dedication or upload his/her own voice. Then displayed on tie computer screen is an accepted screen that informs the listener when the selected file is to be broadcasted with the accompanying dedication, if tile dedication was made by the listener.
A further embodiment of the present invention is where the basic embodiment is modified by the audio and/or video file comprising a song.
A further embodiment of the present invention is where the basic embodiment is modified by further broadcasting the dedication by using a text-to-speech engine.
A further embodiment of the present invention is where the just previous embodiment is modified by the audio and/or video file comprising a song.